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San Lorenzo Initiative
The San Lorenzo Initiative (SLI) is part of Supervisor Lai-Bitker's overall Health Is Not Just Health Care Initiative. Like the broader Initiative, the San Lorenzo Initiative brings together community leaders to assess and develop a plan to address the primary prevention of health disparities through fundamental health development and community resiliency building*. Resiliency planning is a process by which all sectors of a community work together to address issues that community members confront on a regular basis, including those related to diversity, to best improve outcomes in the face of challenges otherwise difficult to relieve such as poverty, cultural and linguistic isolation, and less than functional social and physical environments. The goal of the Initiative is to develop the health of the San Lorenzo community and its residents by understanding the many different ways well being may be affected that are unique to different residents' lives, and then strategically planning together as a community to grow health for everyone and make San Lorenzo a healthier, happier, more productive place to live. Background: Health Development and Community Resilience Protective factors are essential to resilience - a person's ability to recover from adversity and to be capable of building positively on these adversities. When a community is resilient it can respond to adversity or health risks in ways that strengthen community bonds, resources, and capacity to cope as well as individual and collective capacity to respond and change. For example, a neighborhood group may experience significant poverty and a lack of built structural support for childcare such as a local affordable pre-school. Yet, the same neighborhood group may have a strong cultural or faith-based community group that facilitates caring neighborhood relationships and collaborative neighborhood efforts. This informal structure may lead to collaborative community projects or childcare/share-care arrangements that provide affordable care as well as positive relationships and caring climate for youth and families. These strengthened informal bonds may well provide greater individual and community resiliency in the face of adversity. Community resilience and health development planning includes all sectors of a community in exploring prospective factors that contribute to health and well being, most particularly for youth and their families who are perhaps the most dependent upon nourishment of the social world for their overall well being, as well as their capacity to function effectively in everyday life. Cultural and faith-based organizations, health care, mental health, public health, first-responders, housing, transportation, schools, business and media all contribute to resilience yet deal with unique challenges in their efforts to enhance resilience. Integrating knowledge and experience from all sectors and the broad diversity of families they represent is essential to community resilience and health and to the development of appropriate intervention strategies. In facilitating the development of a community resiliency plan, all sectors work together to address issues that community members confront on a regular basis, including those related to diversity, to best improve outcomes in the face of challenges otherwise difficult to mitigate such as poverty, cultural and linguistic isolation, and less than functional social and physical environments. The health of a community has a great impact on the function of its social systems and the condition of the social and economic systems has a significant impact on the health of all who live in the community. Community resilience planning encourages residents to own and hone their support systems and indigenous community resources for wellness and resilience. It provides community residents and leaders with a way to open lines of communication toward a broader understanding of the multiple factors that affect the community's health so that short and long term strategies to build health into the community may be cultivated to enable multiple health objectives, making the community a healthier, happier, more productive place to live. General Planning Process:
The Health Is Not Just Health Care San Lorenzo group has the capacity and interest to provide the leadership for the project. As key stakeholders are identified, their partnership will be engaged throughout the process to further develop the core resiliency-planning group. The outcome will be a community resiliency plan that has broad community support and forms the foundation for effective collaborative leadership and a platform of actionable items toward a healthier more resilient San Lorenzo community. Project Coordination
To best support the efficiency and effectiveness of Health Is Not Just Health Care: San Lorenzo Initiative leadership, the Project Coordinator position requires flexible availability, including evenings for meetings, but also scheduled office hours to be held at the San Lorenzo district office. The task load is envisioned to be 40% planning and 60% community organizing. The average weekly time commitment is 20 hours with some expected variability in the weekly workload over the course of the project. The Project Coordinator reports to Jean Fong, Deputy Chief of Staff for Supervisor Lai-Bitker and acting Project Lead for the Health Is Not Just Health Care: San Lorenzo Initiative.
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